Deandrea Hamilton
Editor
Turks and Caicos, February 3, 2025 – The PDM, if elected government, will create a treatment policy which focuses on getting residents the best possible care and ensure proper funding for treatment abroad travel, said Edwin Astwood during the live-streamed National Debate on Thursday January 30.
“On day one, I will bring a treatment abroad policy to Cabinet, to reverse what is there now. We will ensure wherever you can get the top treatment you will be sent to. Whether it is the USA, whether it is Canada, we will not say that you can only go into the Caribbean region. We want the best for our people, we will put the money there in the treatment abroad policy that we can send you to places where we believe and where the data shows you can get the best treatment possible for you to fully recover and fully be healed, that is what the PDM is about.”
Astwood, who has led the PDM since 2021 and is a former Minister of Health for the TCI said medical centers will not be selected based on a limited budget and a common complaint will be no more.
“We will not send people abroad without having money in their pocket. We will not send people abroad to be put out of hotels. We will not send people abroad to be put out of hospitals. We will ensure that whatever allowance you need, you will get that before you go.”
In July 2022, a National Insurance Board Appeals Tribunal was established to field concerns and respond directly to contributor’s complaints, however, in the years following its set up little has been said about the effectiveness or impact of that body.
Additionally, Astwood addressed the quality of healthcare generally in the islands.
“Our people were healthier 15 years ago. The records can show that; if you look at the birth rate compared to the death rate you will see that that ratio is higher now in ‘23-’24 than what it was in 2017, in 2015 and before. On day one, I myself is going to push through the Cabinet a bill to ensure that primary health care is rejuvenated in all of our communities.
We know that in order to keep our people healthy, we have to look at prevention. Prevention is always better than cure, the honourable premier’s style is always to put the bandaid on the bleed. But we (PDM) always want to go in there and stop the bleeding so that you don’t need the bandaid. So that is what we are going to do, we are going address healthcare at its root cause and put the primary health care clinics back in every community.
He said the goal is for there to be early detection through early screenings. Astwood said the country’s profits in recent years meant it could afford to set up an Intensive Care Unit.
“They also messed up the entire NHIP system. Now our people cannot even get an air ambulance to come to the Turks and Caicos islands because they bankrupted the NHIP. They made it where people are at a critical state.”
The PDM leaders shared that during a recent House of Assembly sitting, members approved $10 million dollars to pay outstanding medical bills.
Also on the PDM agenda is attention to oncology and all aspects of neonatal care due to a raised standard at the Cheshire Hall and Cockburn Town Medical Centers.
“We will get those health professionals in the hospitals. No more will you see persons googling, to find out what your diagnosis is, we will get the proper machines for scanning. No longer will you have those misdiagnosis and wrong diagnosis like under the honourable premier and no more will you be sent to places without money.”
He said the PDM has all of the plans to fix healthcare in the Turks and Caicos.